Importance of Bat Angle

[julray]

In the grand scheme of the overall swing, how important is it?

 

[djcarter1966]

In the grand scheme of the overall swing, how important is it?

It depends I think...how far off of ideal are we talking about, even in Shawns picture you see variation but you don't see straight up and down and you don't see bat completely wrapped. As long as you are not in the extreme AND your lower body is in the correct position at the correct time I'll take it.

What happens in the extremes is you have to compensate and as soon as you start doing that other parts of the swing start compensating and pretty soon you don't have a mechanically sound swing and results will eventually show it.

 

[Fluid Fastpitch]

Do you like preset some of the knob towards catcher in stance?

Most important to me is that they're not a rigid statue in their stance. So long as it's not causing problems in timing, and they're getting into a correct-ish load, then stance is basically a non-teach. (Unless it's waaaaay out of the norm.)
(*I'll pre-set the very beginner's stance, and one of the things I set is hands at the top of the strike zone, knob to catcher's feet. But if they move away from that as they grow, that's fine.)